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Feb 15, 2018

Hero Arts 2018 Catalog Blog Hop and Giveaway

The 2018 Catalog rocks. Check it out! Details on the hop itself and the prizes are at the end of this post.

ABSTRACT SKYLINE BOLD PRINTS

I chose to work with Abstract Skyline Bold Prints. Love it because it's modern and graphic and different from anything else I have. Sometimes I have to step away from the flower patch...

I paired it with sentiments from You Are Loved Messages. 100% of the profits of this messages set go towards fighting bullying. Got to love that.

1. Foggy Card

For the first card, I wanted to create something that looked soft and a little like fog as it went up to the sky.

Blended Distress Oxide inks onto the white embossed design and then trimmed the panel. Flicked some water and added a few raindrops. Hint: blending on Strathmore Bristol Smooth paper is a lot easier than anything else I've tried.

2. Acting Like an Artist

Then I wanted a colorful, modern, abstract look. Put a small dab of yellow and magenta gouache paints on a craft mat and "painted' the stamped image with the edge of an old parking pass (the hard plastic kind that hangs off your review mirror).

The first time I tried it, the gouache covered up too much of the black lines. Toss. (I could have restamped the image after applying the gouache if I had a MISTI big enough to do so. So, I mixed a tiny bit of water it into the yellow gouache with the parking pass, and applied it to the card, and then added some magenta. As I pressed down with the parking pass across the image, the paint spread thin and the colors mixed.

I love how the color changed as I added the magenta and played around with the parking pass. Used linen cardstock as it is very white and holds up quite well to gouache as long as you don't add a lot of water.

3. We Are All One

I stamped the image on water color paper, painted with Distress Oxide inks, lifted off most of the paint with a paper towel, and trimmed to get a different skyline.

And, finally, a non traditional love card. Black "grass" is from the You Are Loved Messages set linked above. Yes, I know the giraffes appear to be walking on top of the grass. My giraffes are magical.

If you got this far, thanks!!!

GIVEAWAY! Hero Arts is giving away three $50 shopping sprees, drawn from comments left across all blogs in the hop. Please comment by Thursday, February 22nd at 11:59pm PT. Hero Arts will announce the winner the following week. Good luck!

BLOG HOP

Can't wait to see what these so talented stampers have created, because you know it is going to be fantastic.

LOVE all your cards! Neither of those sets are ones that would make it on my wishlist normally, but now I want both...oh...and the messages set...so I can CASE these cards! Really beautiful and creative and just...yummy.

Holy cow, these cards are all amazing! I especially love everything you've done with the cityscape. We're talking artistic here! I hear you about stepping away from the flower patch. I'm so stuck there I've grown roots!

Joan... you've outdone yourself. I am amazed at how versatile your style is. you truly have a gift and passion for papercrafting. Now I want the city skyline stamp and the greeting set you featured. I could see me using the city skyline on the back of stamps - as a signature since I live in a neighborhood that looks just like that skyline. Thank you for always sharing so much of what you do. XO

I am so excited about the skyline stamp and so excited to see it used here....I absolutely LOVE the cards you have created! The gouache one is incredible and probably my fave one, but I really like all of them. The giraffes are AWESOME! I love the first one...those colors together!

Beautiful cards Joan, everyone. I love the cityscapes especially the bold yellow and reddy orange one and your giraffes with the score lines heading up are out of this world. Delightful! Thanks for sharing and inspiring.

Wow - what a great collection of cards, Joan!! Your giraffe cards are just beautiful! The gouache technique is interesting and your cards are lovely, especially with that abstract background! I'm still not clear on the parking pass technique you described - maybe my second latte hasn't fully woken me up yet. Did you use the parking pass (or hard plastic) as a squeegee?

Joan - Don't know if you'll get this far down in the comments section but I absolutely LOVE your cards. Your style is different from mine so I get great inspiration from your work. Your truly have an artistic soul! I would NEVER give these stamps a second glance, that's how far outside my norm they are. But your interpretation inspires me to open my eyes and really look at images in a different way. Thanks for sharing your work with us!

When I saw the city stamp I did not like it. But then I saw how you used it and my opinion changed. I love what you did with it. Those soft tones on the first card are lovely! I also really like the giraffe cards. They are wonderful!

What wonderful cards! They are just so different from the normal. I love it!! Love what you did with the bold background stamp and your different coloured giraffes are awesome. You've inspired me to think outside the box. Thank you!!

Great cards, I love the ones with the Abstract Skyline stamp, so diverse. You showed, also with the Safari stamp, what you all can do with one of those stamps. Thanks for the idea's and grogeous examples.

I understand that some of you cannot leave a comment. I cannot figure out why. If you'd like to comment, you can check out my IG feed at dearpaperlicious or you can email me at imakeitalk@gmail.com Thanks for trying!!